"Whoosh... hiss..."
Wind and fire still churned inside the Nine Yang Pavilion, but every sound fell still the moment Han Yansong stepped inside.
The Bronze Gate stood open behind him, his back to the sunlight.
His face was half in light and half in shadow. His hazy, drunken eyes held no emotion, like ice that had not thawed for a thousand years, bottomless.
"Senior Brother Han..."
Feng Xian'er's voice came from outside the doors, thick with tears.
She stumbled across the threshold. Wind and fire had scorched several marks into her deep-blue robes, and her wrists were covered in bloody marks from pounding on the doors.
She saw Lin Shisan kneeling on the bluestone floor, not a single part of his body uninjured. She saw Zi Yuner leaning against the stone wall, more than half her deep-purple Dragon Scale Armor shattered, the golden patterns on her two dragon horns flickering, the blood at the corner of her mouth still unwiped.
"Shisan... Yun'er..."
Feng Xian'er turned to look at Han Yansong in the center of the Nine Yang Pavilion.
Han Yansong did not look at her. He stood at the pavilion entrance, his gaze fixed in the direction of the Nine Yang Cauldron.
Most of Gai Jiuyou's projection had already emerged. Her long, dark-red hair surged like a tide amid the wind and fire. With her palms pressed against either side of the sealing light screen, she was tearing apart the seal of golden runes, inch by inch.
He watched for three full breaths, then took a step forward.
As that step landed, the floor of the Nine Yang Pavilion shuddered violently. The Wind-Fire Vortex parted on its own three feet before him. Flames rolled along the ground, retreating to either side, and sparks skimmed the edges of his robes without